1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to document usability on mobile devices, and more particularly, to a method and apparatus for providing comb text field inputs on a mobile device.
2. Description of the Related Art
The PDF form experience has become a popular means for receiving information from an online user. Often consisting of text fields, the form is an easy way for a user to provide information. A comb text field is a text field that is divided into several combs, i.e., boxes or cells that are of equal dimension and laid out contiguously. Each box contains at most, a single character. This is often used for entering social security numbers or account numbers that have a defined number of characters. The comb text field provides a means for the user to clearly see the information being entered and allows the form author to specify the number of boxes that should be generated, thereby limiting the length of the user input.
However, utilization of comb text fields has been limited to desktop computers or laptops. For example, on a desktop computer, a form filler can fill a comb field in a manner similar to a regular text field, but in a comb field, as the user types the input, the contiguous boxes are filled one character per box. Further, the characters are center aligned and equally spaced from each other. The user can select a box and choose to edit or delete the character in that box. As expected, when a character in a box is deleted, the characters in the boxes to the right are shifted one box to the left.
Technical limitations have prevented utilization of comb text fields in mobile devices. In particular, the user interface utilized on mobile devices simply does not support interactive comb text fields. Accordingly, when a comb text field is rendered on a mobile device, a user is unable to interact with the comb text field.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for a method and apparatus for providing comb text field inputs on a mobile device.